Ogden's Own Distillery is a food and drink brand founded in Ogden, Utah, in 2009.
The first bottle out of Ogden's Own was a liter, and a SLUG Magazine reviewer called it a grenade. Inside was Underground, blended from 33 herbs and flavors. That December 2009 review said it filled the air with black licorice and asked for a smaller bottle. At the time the company billed itself as the city's first licensed distillery since the 1800s.
The partnership began at lunch. Steve Conlin was at a mortgage company as the market collapsed when an acquaintance introduced him to Tim Smith, who wanted to start a distillery. They left lunch thinking, in Conlin's words, "Why not?" He later gave CompanyWeek the short answer: "We were naïve." They started with one product and a marketing budget of $15,000.
Smith hiked into Ogden Canyon and hauled water back for the vodka five gallons at a time. Conlin credited the canyon water for the mouthfeel and said a side effect was that Smith is "a pretty skinny guy."
In May 2020 the company opened a 32,000 square foot distillery in the old stockyard district, and a company release called it the largest independently owned distillery in Utah. The lunch that ended in "Why not?" now comes with an amphitheater.
Ogden's Own once bottled four or five runs a year, and by 2017 CompanyWeek reported it was bottling that many in a month.
